The recovering couch potato’s guide to leaving the house

Your body and mind will thank you

I’m a recovering couch potato.

I was not an athletic child. I didn’t do sports. While I liked riding my bike, I wasn’t someone cranking out 50 miles a day.

That changed in my 20s, when I started running and found that when you go insanely slow, running isn’t so bad. I’ve tried out a variety of sports and physical activities since, from long-distance hiking to rock climbing to weight lifting. While not even in the same category of species as an Olympian, I’d consider myself to be in reasonably good shape.

But I have a dirty secret:

I’m still a couch potato. 

There’s this illusion about people who are fit that they just CAN’T STAY STILL! JUST GOTTA KEEP GOING!!

I don’t have this natural restlessness, but my husband does. He gets antsy if he doesn’t go out for a workout. He cranks out half marathons and then worries that he’s not crushing enough miles.

But me? Oh, baby, I could stay in bed ALLLLLL DAY LONG. 

An unfortunate side effect of sitting around all day — besides back pain and general degeneration — is that the demons come to play.

They have fun, these demons.

They pinch my cheeks, tug at my hair and poke my stomach like the Pillsbury Doughboy, but less cute. They sit on my laptop, saying things like, “It’s funny how dumb you are. Why aren’t you as successful as that person?”

But as Austin Kleon says, demons hate fresh air. 

And so leaving the house — literally, getting outside, walking around for 10 minutes — is my best bet to get out of the funk and out of my head. I have had to deploy many tactics and tricks to JUST LEAVE ALREADY, but it’s worked.

So if you’re a person who struggles with the Big Sad and could use more stupid tips, may I present to you: 

The Recovering Couch Potato’s Guide to Leaving the House

To start off, let me ask the following question:

WHAT IS HOLDING YOU BACK? 

There are infinite excuses. We’re in the age of bed rot and canceled plans.

So let’s tackle each of those excuses and see if we can’t get you outside.

The weather is too hot/too cold/too rainy/too snowy/too apocalyptic

Look, unless ash is falling from the sky, there is no weather too bad for you to get outside. Let’s touch on each potential weather issue.

It’s too effing hot

Listen. Listen. I cycled around Vietnam for 2 months. 

Son, it can get up to 200% humidity in a million degrees. You can sweat by just SITTING STILL. 

The locals are INTIMATELY acquainted with heat. There are a few ways they deal with it:

1. Work/get out during the cooler parts of the day. People often wake up around 4 AM and get going, whether it’s getting to work or exercising. I feel waaaaay less guilty about how I spend my time if I’ve gotten out and exercised earlier in the day.

2. Nap in the heat of the day. In more remote parts of Vietnam, they’ll nap during the afternoon and then get out again in the evening. 

3. Wear looser clothes, long sleeves

4. Swim in a body of water. Mainly the ocean for those who live on the coast.

5. Just deal, this is life

It’s too freaking cold and snowy and icy

What kind of cold are we talking? Are you in the arctic tundra? Do you live in a place that gets freezing rain and it ices over the entire road and sidewalk, making it nearly impossible to walk around?

What you need, my friend, is good GEAR.

A good coat is the first place to start. But also, let’s look at your shoes.

I will probably write some ranty article on how hiking boots are overrated and trail running shoes are infinitely superior, but let me just say this for now: there are a LOT of good options for shoes, especially when it comes to getting outside.

While duck boots might be a good option in snowier regions, I can’t help but feel we’re overlooking the humble sneaker. Whether your style is Skechers, Brooks, or New Balance (if you’re over 60), sneakers can be a great walking shoe, even in winter.

If you’re worried about cold or wet feet, then I have two things to say to you: 1) you’re just leaving your house, you’ll be back, SHOES DRY, and 2) get boots if it bothers you that much.

Oh, and one more thing: if it’s too icy outside, ice cleats fit over just about anything.

It’s too wet outside and my FEET ARE COLD

Take a leaf out of Rihanna’s book and get an umbrella. In the PNW they have a bizarre allergy to umbrellas (“It makes you look like a TOURIST!”) but I promise you, umbrellas are the past, present, and ever-loving future. You can get sweaty in a rain shell and while rain pants are pretty great for longer walks and bike rides, umbrellas are inexpensive and can work with whatever situation you’re in.

Oh, and cold feet? Get galoshes or rain boots.

The weather is gonna weather. You can’t let that stop you from leaving, getting out of your head, and getting into the world and seeing what else is out there.

All my friends are on the computer/TV/phone

I get it. Half of my personality is made up of memes, movie and TV quotes, and obscure internet references. I have gone down many rabbit holes, losing precious hours of my life to the screen. 

Here are a few recommendations:

1. If you can’t resist the siren song of social media (and yes, YouTube counts), then try installing web and app blockers with time limits on them. I use BlockSite and took advantage of an Easter sale to get lifetime access. I have both time limits AND specific times of day where I can use certain sites and apps. It lets me indulge in time-wasting activities, but doesn’t let me get away with it forever.

2. If you are like me where you find loopholes to the previous recommendation, get other people to hold you accountable, whether that’s through threats, bribes, or just changing your password to things.

3. There is strong power in limitation. Let’s say you have a tendency to binge-watch TV. Instead of watching ten episodes of the same show in one go (while looking at your phone the entire time), do this instead: one episode a night. Put away your phone while watching the episode. The complete engagement will take some getting used to, but holy hannah will it make the TV show even more enjoyable.

My cat is on my lap

Forget leaving the house. The cat has chosen you. It’s better if you die before even thinking about moving that cat.

JK nope you’re not off the hook either.

I have a cat. He is the most affectionate cat I’ve ever had. I’ll be sitting on the couch reading the works of Shakespeare surfing the web and he’ll hop aboard, ready for cuddles. And he’ll stay for a solid three hours if I let him.

But a person’s gotta leave the house, so what do I do?

I gently extricate myself from the couch, try not to disturb his position (doesn’t always work and he bolts away like I just jabbed him with a hot poker), and carry on. 

Is it gut-wrenching? Would I prefer to be on that couch with my cat? YES, DUH, OF COURSE.

But for crying out loud, I’ll be back. This isn’t forever, and frankly, it’s embarrassing how much time I’ve already spent talking about my cat.

I don’t have a car and my neighborhood isn’t walkable

Okay, this is a harder one. I won’t tell you to “just walk on the highway! Go against traffic, I see people doing it all the time! Play chicken with the semis, it’s fun!” 

But we know the alternative. The alternative is staying inside, and staying inside summons the Big Sad. Your goal is to leave. 

Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but in my experience, most neighborhoods without sidewalks (because that, to me, defines “unwalkable”) tend to be in more rural areas. That means there’s still areas you can walk. I’ve visited siblings in rural Idaho farming communities and deep-woods Massachusetts. There are limited sidewalks, but even then I’ve gone for hours-long walks. It takes greater situational awareness and CONSTANT VIGILANCE! I’ve dipped into ditches to avoid cars and walked through snowy, icy roads because believe it or not, that was far better than the Big Sad. 

If you’re sick of walking around your neighborhood and you want to get out but you don’t have a car, then I would recommend looking at the public transit options. If there’s a neighborhood you’ve always wanted to check out or some activity you’d like to do (see a movie! Go to a restaurant! Visit the library!) and the public transit is reliable/not scary, then what are you waiting for?

I have nowhere to go and nothing to do

So there are a few ways to tackle this: 

1. Make plans in advance. But make them something realistic and something you’re excited about. Don’t do some aspirational “Oh, I’ll go to the museum and absorb myself in the dadaist artwork of Marcel Duchamp” when you know darn well you’re going to blow those plans off. Make plans WITH SOMEONE. Someone who won’t let you off the hook and will be VERY DISAPPOINTED in you for blowing them off for the third time, RACHEL. 

2. If you have money to spend, spend on something that you are very excited about and/or would be very disappointed in yourself for not getting your money’s worth when you blow off plans.

3. Find some excuse, ANY excuse. If getting an Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen is what gets you out of the house, DO IT. (Food is a strong motivator for me.)

4. Many cities and towns have community activities. They offer classes on all types of stuff, from acting classes to tennis lessons to tai chi in the park. They’re typically low-cost and don’t require much commitment, aside from maybe a night or two a week.

If nothing else, just walk. Get out, listen to a podcast, music, call someone, I don’t know. Leave.

I don’t have the energy

Ah, my old enemy: fatigue. This ODB has brought about my downfall many times. It is the final boss level of leaving the house, of committing to plans, and of being a functional human being in general. 

First off, where’s this fatigue coming from? 

If it comes from work, let’s examine the following criteria that would potentially excuse you from having to leave the house:

1. Your job already requires you to work outside

2. Your job has long hours and involves emergency, life-saving work

3. You started a new job and wow, this is harder than you expected and you’d really rather not go to that social event that you promised your friend you would drive her to, but then this one-time blow off turns into a series of blow offs until you find yourself posting about how great life is just staying in your bed all day but secretly you feel this heaviness in your stomach and a slight lump in your throat and something nags at you that your life is not what you were hoping it would be and you wish that you could make better connections and oh no the demons are back and wow we’ve really spiraled here

4. ???

Number one is obvious. You’re excused. Number two (heh) can be a potentially excusable reason (say, if you spent your shift covered in amniotic fluid). Number three? YOU ARE THE REASON I’M WRITING THIS.

To address point number two: I’ve got some wonderful friends who work in healthcare. They have their own struggles with depression. Some of them dealt with depression before they worked in healthcare, but the physical and emotional demands can sometimes exacerbate that too.

But if you’ll forgive me for bringing up self care: in a line of work where you are expending a lot of physical and emotional energy taking care of other people, you need to be a functioning human being yourself.

So my prescription is the same: 

Leave. The. House. 

Other unexpected sources of fatigue can include:

• Doomscrolling. Because think about all that mental effort you’re putting into looking at anger-inducing media, it’s killing you dude

• You have a million children and have to run them all on errands and you’re just exhausted and how DARE I, A PERSON ON THE INTERNET, SUGGEST YOU GET OFF THE COUCH

• You’ve been sitting around all day and believe it or not, being sedentary begets MORE sedentary

• Maybe having Little Debbie’s oatmeal cream pies for breakfast is not the best way to start the day

• Being stressed about work, bills, life in general

So in light of all this, how do you leave the house when the fatigue is strong and you’re just not feeling it?

At the end of the day, I live by this mantra:

Something is better than nothing.

Repeat this to yourself. Whisper it in the mirror. Print it out on vinyl and paste it on the walls of your home. Shout it from the rooftops:

SOMETHING IS BETTER THAN NOTHING!

You do not (and should not) have to be a purist about this. It will sound incredibly lame at first, but even if you get out for just two minutes, it can help you get into a better mentality about leaving.

Okay. We’re done. Now stop reading and leave the house already.